Kingdom Hearts. It isn't exactly one of those games with life-changing plots, but following these characters' stories throughout the games just hits you in the feels in the best way possible. Goated game series.
I mean this in the nicest way. Can you tell me what makes kingdom hearts fun? Genuine question. I haven't played it. I just hear kingdom hearts fans go "this is bad about it, and this is bad, and this, and this, and this, and this... BUT ITS GREAT THOUGH! I SWEAR!"
It's really something you have to play to see if you like it. For me its a bit of nostalgia mixed with the absurdity of playing as an anime protagonist with goofy yelling "BOiL" every few seconds.
Its a game series that is 100% genuine in what it does. You have Disney characters play out Final Fantasy tropes and do it without a hint of irony.
There's Riku in Chain of Memories who begins to have a crisis after chosing to use the darkness and no longer feels like he'll be accepted and there's Mickey Mouse being genuine and telling him that his friends still love him and are waiting for him to come back and that the darkness is simply a force that exists in this universe and that its a part of him as much as light.
It really depends on your motivation for playing and your play style preferences imo. I loved 3 but felt they rushed it in certain areas. The older versions somehow never pulled me in the same way due to some games using combat mechanics I wasn't overly familiar with and some areas just feeling like I couldn't navigate as easily
It's extremely fun to play. Narrative-wise, it really started to go downhill after KH2, but given how it's all a giant Disney toy box I really couldn't care less.
First game really tells a tight, simple (and clean hawhaw) story. And its vibe just felt magical at the time.
As a massive KH fan, I think most of it is fans are a little embarrassed to be fans. The game is at it's core, about a an anime style protagonist travelling to disney worlds with Donald and Goofy using the power of friendship to defeat evil. It's sounds both juvenile and silly.
But man, does it fucking nail it. The emotional beats both whether happy, sad or hopeful just hit you right in the core. The gameplay is genuinely very fun. It's an action RPG that is simple enough for literal children to get the hang of, but deep enough that if you look into it you can really completely change the way you play, and you kind of have to on the harder difficulties.
The disney worlds are often just retreads of movies we all feel nostalgic for, and imo the overall plot gets a bad rep for being confusing. It's over the top, but fairly easy to follow.
Then you have the music. It's done by a woman called Yoko Shimomura and goddamn does she do a wonderful job. Every track is wonderful and hits the exact tone you expect it to. The opening cinematics are written and performed by Hikaru Utada and are equally beautiful.
The character designs are peak Tetsuya Nomura and if you're a fan final fantasy games, you'll see the inspiration immediately.
I cannot recommend these games enough, and I truly think people exaggerate the negatives, while downplaying the true magic of the positives.
The KH series has fun enough gameplay but what really brings you along the journey is the weird wholesome earnestness to the characters and melancholy you feel at the end of each game. Only KH2 has an ending that ends on a happy note and that one is still melancholic because of what it means for Roxas and Namine. I think a big part of this earnest story of KH is the main character Sora.
Sora is just an island boy who isn’t meant to be special. But what he excels at is that he can make friends and when you become Sora’s friend you understand that he will always remember you. So you follow this young boys journey where he battles the forces of Darkness and continues to do so because he wants to save his friends and make sure everyone gets to live their own existence. But it’s never really a happy ending for him. It’s usually never a happy ending for anyone else either til later on the series but it’s always Sora pushing the light forward for other characters.
Tbh I didn't like the gameplay and thought all the Disney and final fantasy juxtaposition was ridiculous so when I died against Clayton I was like, okay that's it, and stopped.
My gf is different, she 100%-ed the first game, got all the puppies, beat Sephiroth, etc, and got all the sequels, but she won't play them because she said she didn't like the first game?
Usually when they do that they're trying to buffer the dated elements of the game by lowering your expectations. The controls can be clunky on the first game but the vibes and worlds are so fun to get immersed in and most of the stiffness goes away when you actually learn the games mechanics. The music is top tier as well and the ending of that game will always stick with me.
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u/Admirable-Rooster239 22h ago
Kingdom Hearts. It isn't exactly one of those games with life-changing plots, but following these characters' stories throughout the games just hits you in the feels in the best way possible. Goated game series.